Stalking the Dark

by Beyond the Page Publishing

  But he could fight. He had resources. Fighting was more than brawn, just as sex was more than shoving a cock into a willing sheath. Her enemies wouldn’t find him defenseless if they came after her. He thought of the ceremonial dagger—the one he’d tucked away in case the silver bothered her—and recalled the old voodoo priestess who’d given it to him after he’d saved her from two street thugs in the Quarter.

  No, he wasn’t completely impotent when it came to protecting her. That made him feel better. At least impotency wasn’t a problem when she was in his bed. His cock twitched when he pictured Alina, her silky labia glistening with lubrication, her green eyes dark with passion.

  Chapter Four

  A crescent moon hung low in the sky as though it were dropping toward Earth this sultry late spring evening. The smell of gardenias filled Alina’s nostrils when she threw open the French doors in Sam’s bedroom. Moisture saturated the air, bathing her skin in evening dew. Strange how everything about this place—about Sam—heightened her senses, made her feel young. Hang the fact she could personally recall thousands of events Sam knew about only from his history lessons.

  I want you now. Naked. I want to see you in the courtyard, your beautiful body lit by a Creole moon. She smiled. Her lover was testing out her telepathic powers, seeing if she could hear him. His command rang clearly in her head with an intensity so strong she could have heard him a world away, but her usually slow heartbeat quickened with the knowledge that he wasn’t far away. And he was coming quickly, so quickly she didn’t hesitate to do his bidding.

  She dropped the sheet she’d wrapped around her like a toga, laughing aloud at her comparison of the fine bed linen with a garment fashionable during one of the few civilizations older than herself. Slowly, as Sam had commanded, she stepped out into the courtyard, her keen night vision allowing her to admire the graceful wrought iron–topped walls and arches draped with nature’s own cloak of jasmine. She plucked one of the rich red hibiscus blossoms from a bush and tucked the flower behind her ear.

  Sam made her feel like a woman. He seduced her by the strength of his own volition, not by the mirage of desire conjured by her own vampiric seduction. How will I ever be able to let him go?

  She sensed his presence, spied a table set for two, its brilliant white lace tablecloth a beacon in the moonlight. Fat candles flickered in a breeze so slight it caressed her naked breasts like a very careful lover. The romantic setting, an occasional caress of the wind against her cheek, the brush of her hair against her own bare shoulders seduced her, not with one bold stroke but with a subtle harmony of small stimulants blended into a powerful aphrodisiac.

  As she approached the table, the smell of crawfish jambalaya, a spicy Louisiana specialty she dared not sample, tickled her nostrils. A steaming plate of the fragrant dish sat at one place setting. At the other was a single blown-glass wineglass.

  Only two? She’d been so sure he’d been planning a ménage.

  It didn’t matter, so long as Sam was there.

  Still dressed in the khaki slacks and blue striped shirt he’d put on this morning, he emerged from the shadows, a dark green cushion in his hand. His gaze locked on hers, he laid it on the chair in front of the wineglass. “Sit here, my angel.”

  Angel? Seldom if ever had Alina been compared with one of the celestial beings. She wouldn’t challenge her mortal lover, though. Not now, when every fiber of her being longed to have him take her, claim her. In slow motion she moved to obey his softly spoken order.

  The crushed velvet cushion brushed her thighs, her buttocks. So soft it pampered her skin, reminded her Sam cherished her, would protect her as if she were his own . . . his beloved mate. She knew he wouldn’t stand a chance against an attacking vampire, but for reasons she didn’t understand, Sam made her feel safe and protected, her heart guarded from worry, surrounded by his love. She knew he’d give his life to protect her, which made her feel safe in a way she never had before. Perhaps this was what it meant to be truly loved.

  He traced a path along first one of her forearms and then the other, catching her wrists and shackling them to the wrought iron chair arms with padded manacles. “Spread your legs for me,” he ordered once he had her hands secured.

  His gray gaze scorched her flesh when she did his bidding. Her juices began to flow, the smell of arousal tickling her nostrils as her labia grew damp. The touch of his fingertips on the slick lubrication had her muscles clenching . . . releasing . . . her intimate flesh contracting with sheer animal lust. When he inserted a finger and then withdrew it, her usually slow heartbeat pounded against her chest. Her skin warmed, a flush of heat that fed her already raging arousal.

  He raised his head, met her gaze. “I saw your bodyguards this afternoon. They have the Reynard bastard in their sights, so you must not concern yourself with him. Concentrate instead on the pleasure a mere mortal can give you. Meanwhile, allow me to feed you.”

  Alina caught the undertone of resentment in Sam’s voice and understood his frustration at his own impotence against her enemy, but not her own compulsion to put him at ease. “I feel safe with you, Sam, in ways that I’ve never felt safe before.”

  “Don’t patronize me. Just do as I tell you.” He held a finger up to her lips, as though to take away the sting of his words.

  She smiled up at him. “All right, mon cher. Your slightest wish is my command . . . tonight.”

  “Then drink.” Sam brought the fine crystal wineglass to her lips, its contents a dark, rich red. Strong. Sweet with just a tinge of metallic bite that told her it had been freshly drawn.

  His deep, melodic drawl mesmerized her as she did his bidding, savored the sustenance and her lover’s attention. Then she noticed the stark white bandage on his left wrist and froze a moment. “You . . .” He shed his blood for me. “You didn’t have to—”

  “I wanted to give you part of me, just as I want to give you all the pleasure at my command.”

  She looked up at him. “Is it any wonder I feel safe with you, Sam Quill? You make me feel you’d lay the world at my feet if you could.”

  As he reached out and touched her face, she heard his thoughts. I wish I could keep you forever, love you. I wish you were mortal . . .

  Alina quickly slammed the door shut on Sam’s mind. Some things, it was better not to know. Especially when those emotions echoed loudly in her own mind. Just as it was better not to long for things beyond one’s reach. She took another sip from her glass then smiled up at him. “Thank you, mon cher.”

  “And I thank you, for bringing me the sort of joy I’ve been missing for so long.” He knelt at her feet, his head tilted back so he met her gaze. “Mais oui, but you are beautiful.”

  His oddly melodic Cajun dialect sounded beautiful yet strange coming from a man so boldly Anglo. “Merci.”

  “See how you make me come alive for you.” Standing, he shed his shirt, tossing it carelessly on the brick-paved floor of the courtyard beside his shoes. Never taking his eyes off Alina, he unfastened his pants and shoved them down and off, along with sexy silk boxer shorts.

  “Oh, yes.” His cock rose against his belly, long and thick. She wished she weren’t restrained because she wanted to sample the drop of lubrication glistening at its tip. She longed to massage his testicles, which drew up high and tight in their sac as she watched. His mortal beauty, not yet ravaged by time, made her want to take him, turn him, make him hers for all eternity so they’d grow old together . . . but not for many years, the fates willing.

  “Yes.” He reached for the wineglass, held it to her lips once more. “Drink up. Pretend you’re taking it from here”—he gestured toward a prominent vein in his muscular throat—“taking your sustenance from the man who loves you more than life.”

  Did he? Love her more than his own mortality? Alina silently took his offering, savored each taste in her mouth before letting the warm rich fluid trickle down her throat. His blood. Warm, vibrant, like the man himself.

  For a moment
she imagined them in Paris, him at her side as she meted out justice to the other vampires of her clan. A tear rolled down her cheek and tickled her skin, as though it were trying to tell her this could never be.

  His touch as gentle as she imagined it had been when he’d handled Julie as an infant, he caught her tears on his fingertips. Absorbing her doubts, her regrets, her sadness that their love was destined to play out and die. “I command you, get rid of your tears. Focus for now on your lover. On me, my darling.”

  An involuntary smile curled the corners of her lips when he withdrew the empty glass, set it on the table, and came back to her, his own eyes glistening. This strong man would never allow his tears to fall . . . yet she sensed a depth of emotion there that eclipsed that of a virile lover’s affection for the woman currently sharing his bed. “I thank you for my dinner,” she said, every cell in her body tingling with anticipation for his touch.

  “My pleasure.”

  “Are you not going to eat that luscious-looking jambalaya?” Savory-smelling steam still rose from the plate set before his chair. “You will need your strength for the night ahead.”

  He laughed. “I ate in the kitchen. Up until I saw you coming toward me, I’d toyed with the idea of asking a friend to join us, so I set a place for him. But I found I wanted you to myself this evening.” I’ve never minded sharing my lover before, but I won’t share you.

  His words echoed in her head, making her dizzy. I won’t share you. A purely mortal sentiment, but one Alina welcomed even as she feared where it might lead. “I don’t wish you to share if doing so doesn’t please you.”

  Sam moved behind her chair and laid his hands on her shoulders, his touch light, caressing. Suffusing her body with heat and something else. The kind of love she’d sought for centuries but never found, more potent now that she sensed Sam shared those feelings.

  “Everything about you pleases me. You’ve cast your vampire spell over me, but I can’t object. I haven’t felt this young, this alive, since . . .” Since Madeleine died and left me when Julie was only four years old.

  Alina leaned her head back, resting it against the hard-muscled expanse of his abdomen. “I’ve cast no spell, Sam. It may be that some power greater than mine has destined this.”

  Julie stepped over to the other side. There’s not any good reason I couldn’t do the same. Sam slid his hands down the silken length of her arms, laid them over her manacled wrists. Except control. I need to be in control of my lover . . . and there’s no denying she’s the power behind her clan. “What power might that be?”

  She wished she could tell him she would relinquish her position in return for his love.

  But she couldn’t. Not now. Soon, maybe, once Louis Reynard was returned to the Transylvanian dust from whence he’d risen almost a thousand years ago. Once Claude had matured enough to take his rightful place as his late father’s successor. Until then, Alina had to live up to her responsibilities. “The power of your God? He’s mine too, you know, even though most priests would run in horror if they realized some vampires prayed to the same God they do.”

  “What would it be like if I . . .” His question trailed off, almost as though he were afraid to ask.

  “You’d sleep by day and move about by night. Sustain your life with blood. Engage in the sort of vampire orgies you decided not to indulge in on a smaller scale tonight with me and another mortal partner. You could run your business successfully—yet have many of your mortal customers keep at arm’s length away for fear you might suddenly become ravenous and select them as your next meal. And Sam, if I changed you, you’d be more under my power than I am now under yours.”

  He toyed with the bonds that held her, as if he was imagining himself bound and helpless for her pleasure. “Even in bed?”

  “Sometimes.” Turning her head, she nipped the lightly furred skin of his belly.

  “You’d become as smooth as I am, except for your face and head.”

  Sam laughed, a deep rumble she felt vibrating against her cheek. “I could deal with that. I’m not so sure about becoming the filling in a ménage sandwich, though.” She sensed his mind churning, though, projecting silent pictures of orgies where everybody claimed all the others’ orifices and vice versa—the part that seemed to make Sam shudder.

  “It’s our way, mon cher. Not so much different from your own, except we gain sexual pleasure with each other rather than with strangers at a club or dungeon. Only those of us who are incredibly fortunate find a life partner . . . a mate.” She paused, turned her face to his, saw both intrigue and fear in eyes already dark with passion. “Like Stefan. And Claude.”

  “I don’t know. I’m no youngster.” The doubt rang out in Sam’s voice as he bent and loosened her bonds. “I imagine there’s no way you’d stay with me in my mortal world until . . .”

  Until he grew old and died? “I couldn’t. Before my grandfather died, he named me head of the d’Argent clan. It’s a responsibility I can’t shirk, and I can’t pass it on to Claude until he is mature enough to rule.” Alina reached up, laid a hand on Sam’s broad chest as she looked into his eyes. “I couldn’t bear to watch you age and die, helpless to do anything to ease your pain.”

  The look he gave her was one of sadness, resignation. “Then we’d best enjoy what little time we have together. Come here and let me hold you.”

  In slow motion she rose, stepped into his arms. She laid her head on his shoulder, felt the play of muscles there when he moved to encircle her. His heart beat strongly against her breasts, reminding her of his mortality. As though he’d willed it, soft music began to play, the distinctive sounds escaping through an open window, surrounding them in a melancholy melody. A New Orleans instrumental rendition of an old Gershwin song.

  “Summertime.” Haunting, melodious, the song reminded Alina of other times, times when her clan hadn’t lived under the constant threat that in his mad quest to destroy her, Louis Reynard would bring down mortal vengeance on the d’Argents and all vampires. “Dance with me, please.”

  “Relax. Let the music carry us away, just the two of us.” His left hand splayed out across her lower back, his right clutched her left when she laid her right hand on his shoulder. They swayed, naked flesh to naked flesh, his erection searing her belly, his chest hair brushing her nipples. As though the courtyard were an island far from civilization, she let go the tension, the fear that they were being watched, stalked.

  The crescent moon winked down from a starry sky. Cicadas chirped all around them, and lightning bugs gave off bursts of golden light that illuminated fragrant gardenias and jasmine vines. Sam nuzzled her ear where she’d put the scarlet hibiscus blossom. “I hope you don’t mind that I picked it,” she said, her voice husky, as though touched by the warmth and humidity of a New Orleans night.

  “It’s like you.”

  He sounded so wistful that she had to ask why.

  “Both of you will stay in my life just a few days. Yet you’re so vibrantly beautiful, I can’t imagine never having known you.” He held her tighter as the music waned. “I do mind that you can’t stay, but I’ll take all the time with you that I can get.” His erection nudged her belly. When it did, it sent waves of need coursing through her body, making her wet with anticipation. “I want to make love to you here, underneath the stars. Make memories that will have to last a lifetime.” Sliding his hand down her arm, he clasped her backside, lifted her.

  “God, yes. I need you inside me now.” The imprint of his fingers on her flesh fed her arousal as he lifted her, impaled her, filled her with mortal heat as he lowered her slowly, smoothly, until he filled her completely. “Don’t stop.”

  “Wrap your legs around me. Oh, yeah. Like that.” Feel us, baby, and tell me loving you isn’t right. I dare you.

  She couldn’t say their loving was wrong. Having Sam inside her felt perfect, like two halves suddenly made whole. She didn’t dare say what she was thinking, pour out her heart when they both knew their relationship c
ouldn’t last. “I want to carry some memories too,” she said, trying as she did to still the tears that came pouring from her eyes.

  He sank onto a bench, taking her with him. For a long time he didn’t move except to stroke her flesh, claim her mouth with his voracious tongue, apparently unafraid that she might puncture him with her fangs. She clenched her inner muscles, squeezed his flesh. When he freed her lips, she whispered, “Are you certain you won’t come with me when I must go?”

  Though she tried not to intrude on his private thoughts, they came to her almost as if he’d willed it . . . almost as though he shared some of her ability at thought telepathy. I want to . . . but I can’t. God, why did you send her to me? She took in his pain, absorbed emotions as jumbled as her own.

  “No.” With power approaching violence, he lifted her then slammed her back down on him. Almost as if he wanted to hurt her and himself. “I don’t have the mind-set to become a consort to a vampire queen, no matter how much I want you.”

  “All right. I won’t ask again.” Taking over and holding his rhythm, Alina moved hard on him, no longer trying to hold back. When he shouted out in triumph and filled her with burst after burst of hot semen, she shuddered and came. She’d never felt so full, or so empty, as she did when she slumped against Sam’s chest, listening to the hard pounding of his mortal heart against her ear.

  If only she could stay . . . but no. She’d given her promise to Alain d’Argent as he lay dying. Claude wasn’t ready to take over the clan yet, but a voice inside Alina’s head kept saying he would be—soon.

  But not soon enough for her to follow Sam. Follow her heart. Two more days and she would leave this place where hope mingled with sadness. Where she’d found love with this strong, dominant mortal. Their paths would cross occasionally when he came to visit his daughter. It wouldn’t be the same, though, for they’d fallen in love but he wouldn’t change for her . . . and she couldn’t abandon responsibility to her clan to stay with him.